Since Husserl, phenomenological philosophers have dialogued with the empirical sciences in an attempt to contribute to a more complete human science—a science that speaks to the fullness of being human. The job of our philosophers, in this context, is to invite an opening up of an epistemological conversation that renews the sciences’ exploration of human
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Merleau-Ponty (1968) wrote that questioning does not “fill in the blanks” in our knowledge. Instead, “the questions are within our life, within our history. They are born there, they die there, if they have found a response, more often than not they are transformed there” (p. 105). For phenomenologists, questions of any depth are never
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Here’s an example of a phenomenological dissertation method chapter. This paper is the methodology section of Broomé’s doctoral dissertation that outlines the Descriptive Phenomenological Psychological Method of research as taught by Amedeo P. Giorgi. Giorgi (2009) based his method on Husserl’s descriptive phenomenological philosophy as an alternative epistemology for human science research. This method section
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Earlier this year I was invited to Volvo’s headquarters in Sweden to pilot my phenomenologically-based empathy training–afterwards, organizational consultants began to take an interest in what I was doing. Ahrenfelt, a well-known corporate consulting firm, invited me to give a talk at their yearly meeting in Stockholm. In preparing for such a talk outside of
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Philosopher Ludwig Landgrebe (1902-1991) was one of Husserl’s closest assistants. Landgrebe’s description of Husserl below was translated by Algis Mickunas, Professor Emeritus, Ohio University, and included by Lester Embree in his Representation of Edmund Husserl: “Almost everyone who first encountered Husserl experienced something of a disappointment at not immediately seeing any external signs of how
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This conversation between philosopher Susi Ferrarello and me began, as is often the case in phenomenology, with an everyday experience: dreaming. My description of a dream led us to reflect on Merleau-Ponty’s discussions of dreaming and waking perception, and Husserl’s active and passive intentionality. The exchange continued over several weeks, and we’ve summarized it here–
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Introduction Intersubjectivity can be described as a relationship between me and an other. The peculiarity of this relationship lies in the fact that the other is not alien to me, but is “within me” in a way that his or her “otherness” can be investigated beginning with the way in which that “otherness” is imminent
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The students who put this question to me are usually taking their first course in phenomenological or hermeneutic (narrative) psychological research. And in a way, I feel for them, because many of them didn’t expect to be facing something called “epistemology,” and bumping into any number of arcane Greek terms that seem to bear no
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Shogo Tanaka’s site Embodied Knowledge, with which I’ve just become acquainted, approaches the philosophy and psychology of embodiment through the lens of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology. Tanaka teaches at Tokai University in Japan, and he is particularly interested in the dialogue between phenomenological philosophy and empirical sciences such as “neuroscience, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, robotics, etc.”
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This PowerPoint presentation accompanied my 2-day graduate seminar introducing students to the descriptive phenomenological psychological research of Wertz, Halling, and Englander. The seminar was offered as an introduction for students who may never have encountered phenomenology before; its aim was to give students a sense of the kinds of questions descriptive phenomenologists ask, the careful
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